Remarks by Compton Mayor

* I read the racist remarks made by Compton Mayor Omar Bradley (Oct. 13) and also heard his so-called apology on the news. It is hard for me to believe that he is more concerned about how he appears when he goes to New York than about making a racist statement. He says that when the Jews are through with rapper Eazy-E he will end up sitting in prison next to Mike Tyson. I thought Tyson’s manager was Don King.

I think that it’s time for the media to start calling statements like this what they really are . . . racist.

It is time for the one-way street to end. When a black man makes a blatant anti-Jewish statement like this he must pay the consequences and not have it be swept under the carpet.

HARVEY J. GLASS

Sherman Oaks

* My happiness at reading about Bradley’s attempt to educate rapper Eazy-E about the insidiousness of perpetuating racial stereotypes was exceeded only by my anger and disgust when Bradley then turned around and directed stereotypical insults at Jews. It’s sad that Bradley felt the need to attack another ethnic group in order to defend his own. Will people in this society never learn that we don’t have to put others down in order to respect ourselves?

JAN ZAHLER LEBOW

Los Angeles

* I thought it was illegal to discriminate based on skin color. Imagine the uproar that would arise if a meeting were held which openly prohibited black people from attending.

Apparently, the mayor of Compton, rapper Eric Wright and his record company, Ruthless Records, believe discrimination based on skin color is sometimes justified, when it suits their needs. Ruthless Records decided that no white people should attend a meeting to work out a compromise in the video they propose to shoot in Compton (Oct. 14). All parties to the meeting appeared to have no problem with this open racial discrimination.

Racial discrimination against any color skin, including white, is deplorable. The parties involved in this affair need to understand that their use of racial discrimination condones the same practice against them by people with equally small minds, and different skin color.

STEVE FECHNER

Torrance

* It seems a bit odd. The Times takes one of its own editorials (Oct. 14) to condemn the inherent contradiction in Bradley’s anti-Semitic remarks; remarks in which the mayor blamed Jews for funding and controlling “the majority of black exploitation films.” Certainly the repetition of this age-old slur that Jews control finances--one which has, over the centuries, resulted in the death and persecution of millions of Jews--was abhorrent, and Bradley properly apologized. The Times finishes its editorial by saying, “Apology notwithstanding, public officials should think twice before using words as offensive as any rapper’s excesses.”

Then isn’t it a bit contradictory for The Times to publish, that very same day, a commentary in which Bob Jones IV seeks to raise the pride of his own group--”born-again” Christians--by scurrilously labeling lesbians and gays “sexual deviants”? I decry The Times for giving Bob Jones the space and platform from which to repeat his abusive nonsense.

JENNIFER RYCENGA

Claremont